School Choice Most Divisive Proposal, Aide Says

April 27, 1991|Los Angeles Times

SAN DIEGO -- In the week since President Bush introduced his plan to revitalize American education, the proposal to allow parents to choose among public and private schools has emerged as the most divisive element, Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander said on Friday.

The call for developing a voluntary system of national examinations will require the most sophistication of any of the proposals, said Alexander in a speech to a national gathering of the Education Writers Association.

The hardest part of selling the wide-ranging plan will be to ``get people to think of this as a nine-year crusade`` instead of a quick-fix program, he said.

Bush`s ``America 2000`` strategy, which also calls for designing innovative new schools with federal financing help, giving merit pay for outstanding teachers and urging states and local districts to assess their own progress toward meeting the six national goals set last year by Bush and the nation`s governors -- initially was greeted with enthusiasm.

In the past few days, however, criticism has grown, especially over the administration`s push to allow public dollars to flow to private schools if those are where parents want to send their children.

Critics have said that the plan would undermine the public schools and leave most disadvantaged students stranded in a weakened system.

But Alexander said that it is important to give parents, ``especially disadvantaged parents, a broader range of choices.``

He said that the current system of requiring students in most cases to attend whatever school the local district dictates represents the most coercive aspect of life in America.

Alexander said that he would expect any private school that gets public dollars to be held accountable to some public entity, preferably a local agency.

Such a system would broaden the definition of a public school and could allow any entity willing and able to meet the standards -- a city, a public museum, a private institution or a corporation -- to operate a school with tax dollars, he said. Alexander acknowledged that extending tax dollars to religious schools could conflict with the constitutional requirement for separation of church and state.

Developing a system of national tests to see what American students are learning in five key subject areas -- English, math, science, history and geography -- will take time and a sophisticated approach, Alexander said.